Distance Learning Under COVID Left Some Students Unprepared for College
“I feel like I didn’t really learn anything.”
Who could have predicted that this would happen? I mean, other than all of the people who did predict that this would happen.
The Associated Press reports:
‘I didn’t really learn anything’: COVID grads face college
Angel Hope looked at the math test and felt lost. He had just graduated near the top of his high school class, winning scholarships from prestigious colleges. But on this test — a University of Wisconsin exam that measures what new students learned in high school — all he could do was guess.
It was like the disruption of the pandemic was catching up to him all at once.
Nearly a third of Hope’s high school career was spent at home, in virtual classes that were hard to follow and easy to brush aside. Some days he skipped school to work extra hours at his job. Some days he played games with his brother and sister. Other days he just stayed in bed.
Algebra got little of his attention, but his teachers kept giving him good grades amid a school-wide push for leniency.
“It was like school was optional. It wasn’t a mandatory thing,” said Hope, 18, of Milwaukee. “I feel like I didn’t really learn anything.”
Across the country, there are countless others like him. Hundreds of thousands of recent graduates are heading to college this fall after spending more than half their high school careers dealing with the upheaval of a pandemic. They endured a jarring transition to online learning, the strains from teacher shortages and profound disruptions to their home lives. And many are believed to be significantly behind academically.
Colleges could see a surge in students unprepared for the demands of college-level work, education experts say. Starting a step behind can raise the risk of dropping out. And that can hurt everything from a person’s long-term earnings to the health of the country’s workforce.
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Comments
“Algebra got little of his attention, but his teachers kept giving him good grades”
THIS is the problem, not distance learning. Of course, if there is no penalty for ignoring class – whether virtual or in person – children will ignore class.
Don’t blame the virus for incompetent teaching!
It has left them unprepared for K-12, never mind college, although, nowadays, college is just weak minded pablum.
Online learning means that the teacher is a tiny window at the bottom of the screen, while most of the screen real estate is taken up by the video game du jour or that social media garbage.
I have news for you: pre-pandemic high school graduates knew nothing, either.
so… this is the excuse that this generation will give for their poor education. It excuses the bad teachers and the lenient administrative policies and the absent parents and the kids who didn’t know any better than to accept what the system dolled out.
Also remember even MIT waived SAT/ACT, or made it optional. My kid did them and got extra scholarships from his scores but plenty just said woo-hoo no test and got admitted without that test for the past couple of years. And it is a good predictor of success.